Since its introduction, the Digital News Initiative Innovation Fund, our €150 million commitment to supporting innovation in the European news industry, has offered €73.5 million to 359 ambitious projects in digital journalism, across 29 countries. The fund is designed to provide no-strings-attached awards to those in the news industry looking for some room—and budget—to experiment. As we’re only halfway through our commitment, we’re thrilled to open the DNI Innovation Fund for a fourth round of applications. This season’s application round will be open for the next four weeks, ending October 12 (23:59 CEST).

Focus on monetization for medium and large projects

Round 4 of the DNI Innovation Fund will be slightly different from previous rounds for Medium and Large track applicants. We’ve heard clearly that monetization one of the biggest challenges currently facing news publishers. Therefore, for this fourth round of funding, we’re requiring all Medium and Large projects to provide explicit plans for monetization, with clear indicators showing the potential of the project to create economic value added for the business. Prototype projects don’t have the monetization requirement and remain, as in previous rounds, all about innovation.

Here’s a quick reminder of how the Fund works:

Projects

We’re looking for projects that demonstrate new thinking in the practice of digital journalism; that support the development of new business models, or maybe even change the way users consume digital news. Projects can be highly experimental, but must have well-defined goals and have a significant digital component. There is absolutely no requirement to use any Google products. Successful projects will show innovation and have a positive impact on the production of original digital journalism and on the long-term sustainability of the news business.

Eligibility and Funding

The Fund is open to established publishers, online-only players, news startups, collaborative partnerships and individuals based in the EU and EFTA countries. There are three categories of funding available:

• Prototype projects: open to organizations—and to individuals—that meet the eligibility criteria, and require up to €50k of funding. These projects should be very early stage, with ideas yet to be designed and assumptions yet to be tested. We will fast-track such projects and will fund 100 percent of the total cost.

• Medium projects: open to organizations that meet the eligibility criteria and require up to €300k of funding. We will accept funding requests up to 70 percent of the total cost of the project. Important: All medium applications need to include a clearly defined monetization component.

• Large projects: open to organisations that meet the eligibility criteria and require more than €300k of funding. We will accept funding requests up to 70 percent of the total cost of the project. Funding is capped at €1 million. All large applications need to include a clearly defined monetization component.

Exceptions to the €1 million cap are possible for large projects that are collaborative (e.g., international, sector-wide, involving multiple organizations) or that significantly benefit the broad news ecosystem.

How to apply

Visit the new Digital News Initiative website for full details, including eligibility criteria, frequently asked questions, terms and conditions, and application forms. Applications must be made in English and the submission deadline for the fourth round of funding is October 12, 2017. We’re also hosting a live online hangout on with the DNI Fund Team on Tuesday, Sep 26, at 3pm CEST, where we’ll share learnings from the first three rounds of applications and explain what has changed for Round 4. If you have any questions or would like to hear more, hand in your questions upfront on our site.

We’ll announce the next funding recipients by the end of this year. We look forward to receiving your applications!

Editor's note: In April 2015, Google announced the Digital News Initiative, a partnership with European news organizations to support high-quality journalism through technology and innovation. In this guest post, Bart Brouwers, a Dutch journalism professor at the University of Groningen and a council member of the Digital News Initiative’s Fund, looks back at what the Digital News Initiative’s fund has accomplished so far.

If the distribution of money from Google’s DNI Innovation Fund is any indicator of the state of innovation in Europe, then Britain and Germany are doing great.

With more than 90 funded projects between them in the first three rounds of funding, the two countries stand head and shoulders above the others. Germany’s projects have been allocated more than 13 million euros, with around 7 million in Britain. Spain (with 25 projects) is just behind them: 6.6 million euros. My home country the Netherlands is in the middle with 18 projects and allocated funding of 2.5 million euros.

So far, 73.5 million of the available 150 million euro have been distributed. The newest winners were announced on July 6 and we’ll begin accepting applications for Round 4 on September 13.

As a member of the DNI Innovation Fund Council, I often get questions about how the process works, how projects are evaluated and what role the Fund plays in furthering innovation in publishing. I’ll do my best to explain it here.

The DNI Council consists of three Google representatives and ten publishers, scientists and journalists from across Europe. The Chairman is Portugal’s Joao Palmeiro. For the 10 of us who are non-Googlers it’s voluntary work; For us, it’s an opportunity to see behind the scenes of European media innovation. Because of the overwhelming interest (some 3,082 initiatives were submitted for the first three rounds!), the Council focuses mainly on the category of large projects—that is, applications for more than 300,000 euros.

When we met in the Dutch innovation capital of Eindhoven this June to judge the applicants of the third round, the debate occasionally became heated; justifying the acceptance or rejection of a proposal isn’t something any of us takes lightly. The debate over each application, as well as the distribution of funding across countries takes time because, just as the level of innovation differs from country to country, so does the number of applications, the nature of the projects and more.

Because it’s difficult to weigh a blockchain application against a video project or a new distribution model for content we consider six aspects when evaluating projects: the potential impact on the European ecosystem, transformation for the organization, innovation, the use of technology, feasibility and income possibilities. In particular, in evaluating the aspect of transformation, organizations which may be lagging behind in digitization terms are given a bit of an extra chance. This means that sometimes a project receives assistance because the applicant’s organization or country might be transformed by the project—even if a similar project is already running elsewhere.

This is an important point for potential applicants to know: that the presence of a similar initiative elsewhere is not a reason to deny funding. Two initiatives working on a similar topic can sometimes have a better chance of succeeding than just one, and the circumstances between projects are always just a little bit different.

When reflecting upon the trends of which initiatives are receiving funding, I’d argue that it’s not a reflection of the Council’s taste, but of the breadth and variety of the applications. In the first two rounds, for example, as detailed in the DNI Innovation Fund Report, seven categories rose to the top: Intelligence, Workflow, Interface, Social, Business Model, Distribution and “Next Journalism.” This last group—far and away the largest—includes issues of verification (pretty much everything summed up in the battle against fake news, and restoring trust in journalism). Around 25 projects of this type received support in the first two rounds—and funding was decided before “fake news” became household language.

Of course through the Digital News Initiative, Google wants to display its friendliest face to the European media sector. That this image cannot be taken for granted recently became apparent again with the 2.4-billion fine imposed by the European Commission in its antitrust action for Google’s shopping comparison service, but the internet giant has also had other difficulties with Europe. Free news, a "captured" advertising market–these are just a few of the accusations which the publishers and the European Commission lay at Google’s door.

The DNI Fund meets a need, both for the news industry as a whole and for the individual players in it. Given the massive volume of applications, there certainly appears to be no shame in taking Google’s money.

Recently many DNI-Fund supported project teams from all over Europe met in Amsterdam to demonstrate their progress. For many, the DNI support was essential to the steps they have taken so far—and that progress should be celebrated. But it should not gloss over the fact that true innovation entails plenty of failure. For Council members, this comes up quite often: how important is it to support initiatives whose feasibility might be doubtful, but which could certainly inject new movement into the sector even if they fail? For the time being the need for media innovation in Europe is still so great that the answer is a full-throated yes.

Would you also like to submit an application to the DNI fund? Submissions will open again starting September 13 until October 12. More info on the DNI website. You can also download our first DNI Innovation Fund report 2016-2017 to read more about our funded projects and key insights.  

Editor's note: In April 2015, Google announced the Digital News Initiative, a partnership with European news organizations to support high-quality journalism through technology and innovation. In this guest post, Bart Brouwers, a Dutch journalism professor at the University of Groningen and a council member of the Digital News Initiative’s Fund, looks back at what the Digital News Initiative’s fund has accomplished so far.

If the distribution of money from Google’s DNI Innovation Fund is any indicator of the state of innovation in Europe, then Britain and Germany are doing great.

With more than 90 funded projects between them in the first three rounds of funding, the two countries stand head and shoulders above the others. Germany’s projects have been allocated more than 13 million euros, with around 7 million in Britain. Spain (with 25 projects) is just behind them: 6.6 million euros. My home country the Netherlands is in the middle with 18 projects and allocated funding of 2.5million euros.

So far, 73.5m of the available 150m euro have been distributed. The newest winners were announced on July 6th and we’ll begin accepting applications for Round 4 on September 13th.

As a member of the DNI Innovation Fund Council, I often get questions about how the process works, how projects are evaluated and what role the Fund plays in furthering innovation in publishing. I’ll do my best to explain it here.

The DNI Council consists of three Google representatives and ten publishers, scientists and journalists from across Europe. The Chairman is Portugal’s Joao Palmeiro. For the ten of us who are non-Googlers it’s voluntary work; For us,: it’s an opportunity to see behind the scenes of European media innovation. Because of the overwhelming interest (some 3,082 initiatives were submitted for the first three rounds!), the Council focuses mainly on the category of large projects—that is, applications for more than 300,000 euros.

When we met in the Dutch innovation capital of Eindhoven this June to judge the applicants of the third round, the debate occasionally became heated; justifying the acceptance or rejection of a proposal isn’t something any of us takes lightly. The debate over each application, as well as the distribution of funding across countries takes time because, just as the level of innovation differs from country to country, so does the number of applications, the nature of the projects and more.

Because  it’s difficult to weigh a blockchain application against a video project or a new distribution model for content we consider six aspects when evaluating projects: the potential impact on the European ecosystem, transformation for the organization, innovation, the use of technology, feasibility and income possibilities. In particular, in evaluating the aspect of transformation, organizations which may be lagging behind in digitization terms are given a bit of an extra chance. This means that sometimes a project receives assistance because the applicant’s organization or country might be transformed by the project—even if a similar project is already running elsewhere.

This is an important point for potential applicants to know: that the presence of a similar initiative elsewhere is not a reason to deny funding.  Two initiatives working on a similar topic can sometimes have a better chance of succeeding than just one, and the circumstances between projects are always just a little bit different.

When reflecting upon the trends of which initiatives are receiving funding, I’d argue that it’s not a reflection of the Council’s taste, but of the breadth and variety of the applications. In the first two rounds, for example, as detailed in the DNI Innovation Fund Report, seven categories rose to the top: Intelligence, Workflow, Interface, Social, Business Model, Distribution and “Next Journalism.” This last group—far and away the largest— includes issues of verification (pretty much everything summed up in the battle against fake news, and restoring trust in journalism). Around 25 projects of this type received support in the first two rounds—and funding was decided before “fake news” became household language.

Of course through the Digital News Initiative, Google wants to display its friendliest face to the European media sector. That this image cannot be taken for granted recently became apparent again with the 2.4-billion fine imposed by the European Commission in its antitrust action for Google’s shopping comparison service, but the internet giant has also had other difficulties with Europe. Free news, a ‘captured’ advertising market – these are just a few of the accusations which the publishers and the European Commission lay at Google’s door.

The DNI Fund meets a need, both for the news industry as a whole and for the individual players in it. Given the massive volume of applications, there certainly appears to be no shame in taking Google’s money.

Recently many DNI-Fund supported project teams from all over Europe met in Amsterdam to demonstrate their progress. For many, the DNI support was essential to the steps they have taken so far—and that progress should be celebrated. But it should not gloss over the fact that true innovation entails plenty of failure. For Council members, this comes up quite often: how important is it to support initiatives whose feasibility might be doubtful, but which could certainly inject new movement into the sector even if they fail? For the time being the need for media innovation in Europe is still so great that the answer is a full-throated yes.

Would you also like to submit an application to the DNI fund? Submissions will open again from September, 13 until October, 12. More info here. You can download our first DNI Innovation Fund report 2016-2017 here to read more about our funded projects and key insights.